John T Unger Artist's Portfolio

Artist John Unger to Talk About Graveyard Sculpture Installation

Artist John Unger to Talk About Graveyard Sculpture Installation

Charleston Times-Courier, Charleston, IL, February 12, 2000, C9

CHARLESTON— Chicago artist John Unger will present a gallery talk about his life-size graveyard sculpture installation at the Tarble Arts Center, Eastern Illinois University.

The talk will be at 2 p.m. Sunday. Admission is free and the public is invited. The exhibition of the installation continues through March 5.

Titled "Radio Ancestrale," Unger's installation resembles walled graveyards seen in New Orleans and Haiti and draws inspiration from a variety of African and Caribbean cultures. States Unger, "My work taps deeply into trickster traditions of African folk art, ritual and magic."

His work borrows from the cosmology of West Africa, the Congo, and Haitian Vodoun as well as "the deep, night-time music and life of the Mississippi delta." Sound is also a key element of Unger's work, so the installation is experienced rather than just looked at.

The tombstones and graveyard walls are made of wood and concrete. radios, ceramic figurines, toys, tools and other every-day objects are imbedded in the tombstones. Sound and music from a CD created by Unger is "broadcast" through each of the radio's speakers to envelope the viewer in sound.

Unger has exhibited at the Hyde Park Arts Center, Intuit: the Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art in Chicago, and other Chicago galleries. The "Radio Ancestrale," project is funded in part by the Excellence in Fine Arts Visiting Artist Series of the EIU College of Arts and Humanities.

(details about gallery hours and address elided... Visit the The Tarble Arts Center website for current information.)

Visit the Radio Ancestrale website to see the entire exhibit.

On Exhibit: A Secret Society Shows Itself

On Exhibit: A Secret Society Shows Itself by: Michael Bulka

 

A year ago this month I was abducted by a tough-looking character with a filterless Camel dangling from his lips. He placed a calloused hand on my shoulder and said, “come with me.” I hesitated. “Don't worry,” he said. “You won't get hurt.”

He brought me to a nondescript storefront in East Pilsen where I was forced to listen to a CD of some Deep South banjo picking. A group of people got up from a table full of steaming food and placed leis and chains around my neck. A cape was draped over my shulders and a titanic sombrero balanced on my head. A fellow who looked to be the leader of this mob handed me a two-foot-long pipe brush. “This is your scepter,” he said.

“Welcome to the weekly meeting of the Ever-So-Secret Order of the Lampreys,” this fellow—we'll call him K— said. “You've been selected as our adjudicator. It is your duty to judge the art that's been made over the last week by our members. Tonight you are all-powerful. You are a deity. Wield your power wisely.” He motioned for me to sit in a chair.

For the next two hours I watched and judged as some two dozen sculptures, drawings, paintings, poems, and musical pieces were paraded before me. All the artwork, I learned, was inspired by a single word: “Bodacious.” The Lampreys fittingly are a bodacious bunch.

“A couple of years ago I was sitting around thinking, 'all I ever do is make stuff for clients,'” says K, a tall guy with a Dixie accent and hair that changes colors as often as the wind changes directions. “I do architectural ironwork and ceramic and marble work. I enjoy making objects; it's a good way to make money. But I like to make sculpture. I like to make useless objects. So I brainstormed with my buddy S, my roomate at the time.

K and S had met when S crashed one of K's parties. K throws parties at the drop of a hat. He'll even celebrate the night before a party. His semiannual pig roasts are known far and wide, attracting hundreds of artists, musicians, old hippies, bikers, manic-depressives, bookies, and schoolteachers. K took and immediate liking to S, a sculptor from Australia, and hired him to work in his metal shop. A couple of weeks later, S and his girlfriend, L, moved into K's spare bedroom.

“We were drawn together,” K says. “He had a similar problem.” S spent every waking hour making art for his portfolio. His only concern was the business of making art. K and S brooded over glasses of whiskey one night. They mooned over their idealistic days as aspiring artists. “It was a blast back then,” K says. “Then we started taking ourselves too seriously.”

“So we decided to make an object once a week that's not related to our portfolio, our clients, to anything. It would be absolutely nonmarketable. L told us about this big Sunday brunch at her family's house in Australia. Everyone had a standing invitation and would get fed well.

K found it impossible to pass up yet another excuse for a party. He and S planned to make new pieces for a brunch the following Sunday. “That first week, there were the two of us,” K recalls. "L thought it was kind of cool, so the next time there were three of us. Someone heard about it, and the next week we had four.” Within months the revolving cast of artists and hangers-on numbered in the dozens. Soon the brunch became a ritual that had to be codified.

“We decided we would no longer own our pieces,” K says. “They would become the property of the group. We also figured if we were going to present our pieces formally there should be some kind of ceremony with someone chosen to preside over the presentation.” Thus began the tradition of kidnapping some unsuspecting sap to be the adjudicator.

“The adjudicators are dressed awfully silly,” K acknowledges. “You cannot have a secret society that doesn't have a set of absurd rules. With this comes a great deal of pomp and circumstance. We take it to the extreme by allowing the adjudicators to believe they are all-powerful. There was one adjudicator who demanded that we all get naked. We thought about it but then realized there were some members who didn't want to. So there was a coup. We shouted, “The king is dead; long live the king!”

The adjudicator bestows an array of fanciful awards. A scrap of polished wood is know as the False Gem of Hope. A well-worn wig is the Matted Hair of Revulsion. The Sardines of Delusion is a can of (what else?) sardines, while the Banana of Ill Repute is a two-year-old black, shriveled banana.

“This whole idea caught on,” K says. “Everyone we invited to the meeting started participating. We come from a lot of different backgrounds. We have trolley drivers and carpenters. there are some people who've never made art before. One guy, a computer programmer, joined us for the word 'spicy' and sewed 400 chili peppers to a pair of boxer shorts and wore them and nothing else, dancing into the room.” With so many making art, it became obvious a weekly theme was in order. So at the end of his or her term, the adjudicator has the task of choosing the next week's word. “Our first word was 'structure,'” K says. “Then we had 'symmetry.' We had 'beef.' then there was 'lagniappe,' a little something extra. then there was a made-up word from sci-fi, 'grok.'”

Early on someone suggested the group needed a name. A Lightbulb went off over K's head. “Society has always viewed artists as lampreys, sucking on its soft, fleshy underbelly,” he says. “We decided to claim the name. We suck.”

These being artists, a late-morning starting time for the brunches was as welcome as a 3 AM alarm clock blast. The Lampreys began to gather later and later in the day. Now dinner is served at around 8:30 or 9 PM.

In November 1998 the Lampreys erected an altar to the memory of Nikola Tesla for a Day of the Dead exhibit. “Tesla was a nut,” K says. “He was a Lamprey.” Someone described it to Chuck Thurow, director of the Hyde Park Arts Center. Thurow dropped in on a Lamprey meeting and decided, almost on the spot, to offer the gallery to them for an exclusive show.

“Three and a Half Months of Sundays” will open this Sunday, March 5. The group will erect altars to such overlooked geniouses as Sen No Rikyu, who several centuries ago elevated the simple Japanese afternoon tea to a formal ritual, and Philo Farnsworth, who invented the TV picture tube but had to sue RCA to earn royalties. The altars will surround a centerpiece containing 2,000 Lamprey pieces, displayed together for the first time.

“One of the problems with showing Lamprey work is that it's not very commodified,” K says. “It's not something we can sell. We can't be shown in a typical gallery because there's no money to be made off us. It's more about the process and the meeting each week. The object becomes de-emphasized and less precious. the collection becomes fascinating.”

I was fascinated that Sunday night a year ago. After I'd reviewed all the art and passed out the awards, K told me I had one final duty: choose the next week's word. I pondered for ten minutes and then wrote on a big chalkboard the word “mortar.”

Immediately K stripped off my royal raiment. “Now you're nothing,” K shouted gleefully. the tough-looking character with the filterless Camel dangling from his lips smirked. “You're just like one of us,” he said. I couldn't wait to come back the next Sunday.

The opening party for “Three and a Half Months of Sundays” will be held from 4 to 6 PM this Sunday at the Hyde Park Arts Center, 5307 S. Hyde Park Blvd. A closing party will be held from 5 to 9 PM on Saturday, April 15. call 773.324.5520 for more.

Reviews and Press for John T Unger

My work has appeared or been written about in the following books, magazines and newspapers.
Mosaic Art and Style: Designs for Living Environments Mosaic Art and Style is JoAnn Locktov's beautiful follow-up to The The Art of Mosaic Design, the book that inspired me to make mosaics. Mosaic Art & Style is focused on architectural installations, decorative and functional objects and how they can be integrated into the home or public environment. My Acrobat Fence is featured on page 117.
The Artful Home, Edition 2, Guild Sourcebooks, 931 E. Main St., Madison, WI, 53703, 2004, 86 “Part consumer guide, part sourcebook, this book shows readers how to select, display and care for artworks in all media. In addition, more than 800 photographs show the best new projects of top artists who create works for the home. Best of all, complete contact information allows the reader to purchase existing works directly from the artists’ studios or arrange custom artwork commissions.”
Patty LaNoue Stearns, “Have a Seat,” Northern Home Magazine, Vol. 9, No. 1, January-February, 2004, 9 “Mancelona Artist John T. Unger created the third chair,                     an art piece with a mission: this copper- metal-acrylic rocker                     has unique ergonomic properties—the top disk fits right                     between the shoulder blades. Call Unger at 231-584-2710 or                     visit www.johntunger.com to check out his fabulous metal works                     and mosaics.”
"The Days of the Dolphins," 4 marble mosaics, Northeastern University Magazine, Vol. 28, No. 2, 2002, 14, 17, 21-22 Eson Chan, Art Director at Northeastern University Magazine, commissioned four mosaics to illustrate an article about dolphin watching off the coast of Spain. Days of the Dolphin, by Gary Goshgarian ran in the November Issue, 2002. Although created expressly for publication, the mosaics remain in the university's permanent collection. View larger images of the mosaics  here.
6 page pictorial spread, The Cream City Review, Vol. 24, No. 1, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Milwaukee, WI, 30-35, 134
In 2001, I was a featured artist for Chicago Artist's Month, representing the 31st Annual Pilsen East Artist's Open House. Pictured with me in the photo are Mike Helbing and Jeff Abbey Maldonado. Marc Hauser was the photographer. He also shot the portrait I use on the About the Artist page.
Michael Bulka, “Pilsen On Display,” New City, Artbreak, Chicago, IL, September 28, 2000, 25. This review of the Pilsen east Artists' Open House mentions both myself—“John Unger is showing voodoo-inspired weather vanes, mosaic and sculpture...” and the Lampreys, an infamous group I ran with in Pilsen— “The Ever So Secret Order of the Lamprey, an organization that has been described as a carnivorous hippie art cult, will display some of their vast archives of improvised artwork at the clubhouse at 2025 South Halsted, as well as some real paintings by one of the initiates, Marjorie Boyle. Be careful, they may try to seduce the unwary with tales of art and meat and fire and booze.”
“On Exhibit: A Secret Society Shows Itself,” Chicago Reader, Chicago, IL, March 3, 2000, Section One, 38. This article about Ever So Secret Order of the Lamprey was written right before our first big show at the Hyde Park Arts Center. The photo for this article was digitally altered to protect our secret identities, but that's me on the far left. Yes, I could identify the others in the photo, but then they'd have to kill me. Click here to read the article in full and see a larger image of the photo.
Cover Feature, Charleston Times-Courier, Spotlight Arts and Entertainment, Charleston, IL, February 12-18, 2000, 1. Radio Ancestrale made the cover of the paper.
“Artist John Unger to Talk About Graveyard Sculpture Installation,” Charleston Times-Courier, Charleston, IL, February 12, 2000, C9. Read the article here.
Sextablos: Works on Metal, Luna Press, 1715 S. Laflin, Chicago, IL, 1999, 15 Page 15 has a photo of one of my pieces from the show... I also wrote one of the essays for the catalog, “Sold My Soul for Rock 'N Roll.” Read the essay here.

Sold My Soul for Rock 'n Roll: Catalog essay for the exhibit, Sextablos: Works on Metal

Note: I was aked to write an essay about “sex and rock 'n Roll and art” and I had a ball with it. However, if you are easily offended by strong language or adult content, you might want to skip this one. If not, read it out loud at the top of your lungs… It sounds really great that way!

Way down deep in the juicy delta, the steaming crotch of America's sultry, painted self, the phrase “Rock n' Roll” crawled up out of blood and mud and sweat maybe thirty years before the music ever let wail. And straight from the jump Rock n' Roll meant doin' itå makin' it, shakin' it, stirring things up. What was born as a popular idiom for fucking soon latched on to a blazing new sound and became a powerful, elemental force of nature. And that force got in people, made 'em move, made 'em do things, spawned revolutions from gyrating hips and a pulsing, throbbing beat. Rock was the heart of the sexual revolution that tore away America's inhibitions as fast as busting a hymen in the back seat of daddy's car. Without even taking the jeans off.

Rock n' Roll is a hot thing and loud. A primeval beast with an eight-cylinder engine, revving high, raring to go. Fast, furious, out of control and above all, loving every minute of it. Like the ancient gods of sex and death, Rock strikes it's surest stance standing at the sacrificial precipice, ready to throw it all away for the long shot of just scratching that little itch.

Rock cuts deep, to the roots, to the bones, to a beat so old only the body remembers it. Oh, but the body remembers it perfectly. Rock n' Roll is a religious experience, but we're talking Old Time Religion, an experience in the body, of the body and of the other's body. Blood and soul. Communion. A commitment, not to lover, god or country, but to living forever. Right now. Going all the way.

Rock n' Roll throws sparks stolen right out of gospel's divine flame and carried off in the juke joints' Bar-B-Que. To the preacher, these stolen coals look like hellfire and brimstone, eternal damnation, but when the sparks hit the crowd it's the same power. The common denominator of human nature is the desire to transcend human nature. Sex , Rock and religion all generate the kind of raw power needed to leap that high or sink that low. Look and you can see it—watch 'em jump and twist like a tent revival caught on the electric barb of God's hook.

This upstart, bastard child of spirituals and the Devil's music, this juvenile delinquent, can be counted on but never trusted. Ever restless, despite a visceral and diverse heritage, Rock n' Roll casually, brazenly, boosts any new style, riff, instrument or toy it can get it's hands on, stuffing the pockets of it's leather jacket. This very innovation is the source of Rock's immortality, it's legendary attitude of invincibility: whenever you think rock is dead, jump back! It's just gearing up for a new incarnation.

Art was born in a cave. Rock n' Roll was born in a space not much more refined and it's soul has lived in basements and garages ever since. Christ was born in a manger, which explains, maybe, why He's a little more civilized. Sextablos throws these three into bed and the possibilities are limitless.